Great article on Lifehacker.com. One key weakness of Google Chrome is that it doesn’t have Google’s toolbar. Come on, Google, Jeez! One workaround is to pin your recent pages on the initial screen. This Chrome New Tab extension looks like its a step further in the right direction.

Chrome’s New Tab extension installs as an extension and can be edited under Tools | Extensions. You can have it load a page that you specify when opening up a new tab. Options include your recent history, Facebook, any URL that you select, or even a file on your hard disk. For me, I want new tabs to default to Google’s search page.

Check out the keyword difficulty tool from SEOChat.com. SEO consultants use tools like these to get a ball park on how difficult it is to rank 1st for submitted keywords. The higher the percentage, the more competitive the field is and the harder it is to rank first.

This summer, there were a slew of free $100 cash bonuses for opening up new bank checking accounts. Various conditions applied, such as a minimum of $250/month direct deposit or ten on-line bill pays.

Some of the ones that I tried out were Bank of America’s $100 bonus which required a $250 deposit and only two on-line payments. It was pretty decent deal but it took over 100 days to receive the cash bonus. Still, I use BofA card to get free admissions to museums – particularly the local science center. So the value of this bonus keeps increasing.

It hits home because I have a Hoover vacuum cleaner with the old style vacuum bags that I bought in 1994. I’d love to get rid of it but this thing really sucks. Its lasted through cleaning roomfuls of Marine barracks for our weekly inspection, then survived several households full of college students, multiple roommates and now, extended family members.